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Comment by chairmanwow | Hacker News Reader

> Between 2005 and 2016, the most recent full year of data, the company saw an 83 percent decrease in the number of incidents that resulted in days away, work restrictions or job transfers – to an all-time low of 1.55 incidents per 100 full-time North American employees.

I find it incredibly impressive for a manufacturer to achieve something like this.

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I'm not sure how much to congratulate them, since 2005 is almost exactly when the cost of programmable robotic arms became far cheaper than the cost of worker injuries.

I've been working for automotive suppliers since 2006 and I've never seen a factory worker doing anything remotely strenuous or dangerous. Programmed robotic arms do almost literally anything involving lifting, and almost anything involving a dangerous tool or machine. Additionally, every workcenter is outfitted with lots of sensor-laden safety systems that all but ensure the operator is far away from anything that could hurt them. 99% of the accidents I see on reports involve ladders, box cutters, hi lo carts, etc.

It was an incredible contrast to tour the BMW factory in Munich in August, then the Tesla factory in Fremont in October. The BMW factory was highly automated, and the assembly line did so much for the humans -- positioning the cars in just the right ergonomic locations for humans to work on them. Meanwhile, over at Tesla, forklift drivers are crashing into things, dragging chunks of wood under their wheels, so much more manual labor, etc. I don't expect Tesla to be up the level of BMW; the volume isn't there to justify it. It's just really interesting.

I'm trying to think of when I would have seen BMW factory employees working overhead, and I just can't think of it. I wonder why Ford would even have tasks that require this rather than just rotate the assemblies being worked on.

I actually think it owes to the fact that it was never reasonable for any worker to work “overhead” all day, unassisted; the human body can’t take it.

Working with your arms outstretched in front of you, Minority-Report-style, has been determined to be not feasible due to fatigue, so how is working overhead reasonable? I’ve never been in a car factory or on an assembly line, but from an armchair it sounds bound to lead to a lot of strain.

Why not have workers lie on their backs on carts or something?

When you put effort into making a person's job better it not only reduces their actual injuries but improves their well being as they don't feel ignored. combine the two and the pay off is real.

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